what are ‘angelheaded hipsters’?
Jul 16
are any of you guys/gals excited about ‘howl’? i’m not sure if i want to invest the energy to get my hopes up, but when in doubt fall feet first. i watched the trailer a few days ago – movie trailers tend to put me off. instead, four clips from ‘howl’ for you below. the second clip has fucked sound/visual synchronicity, but we are evolved peoples and we can get the gist. i’m sure i’ll wait for the dvd, cause i hate watching movies in public venues with total strangers.
thoughts?
also, i was perusing links on the twitter yesterday and came across this. the twitterer said something with regards to all females needing to read this, but honestly – this has nothing to do with the sexes and everything to do with finding one’s bootstraps and hoisting the defeated lump of yourself back to an upright position – you know, not just surviving but thriving? i swear this is no cookie cutter gary quinn life coach to the stars bullshit so – boys too : read.
oh and if you’ve got twenty bucks, another valerie has created a twak? inspired commodity. i wanted a fanny pack, as i strive to be the ultimate hipster, but life is all about disappointment now isn’t it?
Jul 16, 2010 @ 10:54:06
Do you identify with the good guys, the innocents, the lawless, the children, the left-out, the pure, the used, the fools, the downtrodden, the ‘us’ in the ‘us vs. them,’ the “defeated lumps,” the “bootstrap”-less, the barely-surviving, and the first ones in line after the last cookie was distributed?
But about the film, I can’t grok that cute James Franco as Ginsburg, even if makeup managed to uglify him somewhat. I hope I’ll get over that via the quality of the acting.
I threw the word “grok” in there NOT because it’s an angelheaded hipster word but because it belongs in the same thread as “twak.”
Also, this might be the place to mention something i’ve been thinking lately: now that I’m an old lady, I don’t want to be anyone’s “old lady.”
React
Valerie Reply:
July 16th, 2010 at 11:44 am
@SandraJaye,
i am christ-like and identify with all abandoned children. my little lonesome lovely flock of sweet soft drooling babies. i walk the line of between workerbee and government assisted poverty. and like the rest of us, i will lose balance and eventually fall. hopefully wal-mart will still have greeter positions when i’m eighty – cause if i’m still kickin i’m pretty sure that’s the only way i’ll be able to afford my depends.
i am not afraid to admit i heart james franco’s face – fuck you all i don’t care. i never had a thing for him until pineapple express and i don’t know about you but i fall hard for an uninspired pothead – especially if they deal cause that means free weeds for mees.
being almost thirty two, maybe technically i’m not old, but i feel age in my bones: i never know what’s going on – i’m like “kids today” and “no respect” and “when i was your age”. these things echo in my head same as “you always said you’d never say those nagging things and you’d always keep it real you fucking hypocrite” but i’ll cut myself slack – i DO keep it real, real full of keifer (for regularity), passing out after a few beers mixed with two glasses of rosé before ten pm and i try to listen to ‘fear of a black planet’ at least once a month (on cassette). as for being someone’s ‘old lady’, i like it. i was someone’s ‘fucking bitch’ for way too long. two different worlds of existence, and life now might be moving to a still and not as excite but it’s much sweeter slow. sweeter like blacker the berry – sweeter the juice? or no, wait what was I talking about?
React
Jul 16, 2010 @ 16:07:19
Thanks for the Howl clips. I am pretty excited for this movie. Not just because I thought James Franco was incredible in Pineapple Express, but because it’s about Allen FUCKING Ginsberg! I mean come on! With that said I will still wait for the dvd.
The letter you linked to between the stuck woman and Sugar was good. You can tell Sugar invests a little more in her replies than Dear Abbey. That is a pretty cool thing for a person to do, and that makes me feel better about the world.
I think at points it got repetitive, even though it was full of emotion. I use a little book called ‘The Prophet’ by Khalil Gibran to give my brain some tracks to chug-a-lug on. All of the chapters are short and to the point. If I were to speak to the person ‘Stuck’ I don’t think I would have reached her as well as Sugar probably did, but I would have shown her this quote on pain, and also the chapter on joy and sorrow:
On Pain
Your pain is the breaking of the shell that encloses your understanding.
Even as the stone of the fruit must break, that its heart may stand in the sun, so must you know pain.
And could you keep your heart in wonder at the daily miracles of your life, your pain would not seem less wondrous than your joy;
And you would accept the seasons of your heart, even as you have always accepted the seasons that pass over your fields.
And you would watch with serenity through the winters of your grief.
Much of your pain is self-chosen.
It is the bitter potion by which the physician within you heals your sick self.
Therefore trust the physician, and drink his remedy in silence and tranquillity:
For his hand, though heavy and hard, is guided by the tender hand of the Unseen,
And the cup he brings, though it burn your lips, has been fashioned of the clay which the Potter has moistened with His own sacred tears.
_______________________________________________________
Even though Gibran mentions a God like figure throughout the novel, it is not a religious book.
For anyone interested in ‘The Prophet’ it is hosted on multiple websites, including this one here: http://leb.net/~mira/works/prophet/prophet.html
And Sandra, I like what you said about not wanting to be someone’s ‘old lady’. When you figure out what you don’t want, you can take steps to avoid it. Thankfully you know what you don’t want before having to live through it.
React
July 17th, 2010 at 11:22 am
@The Humanist, Great, The Prophet, that takes me back to high school. What about the Little Prince? Or Jonathon Livingston Seagull? To me, books like this are merely anaesthetic for the mind.
React
Nathan Tyree Reply:
July 18th, 2010 at 2:14 pm
@Mather Schneider, Jonathon Livingston Seagull meant a lot to me in Jr High. I guess I outgrew it, though
React
Valerie Reply:
July 19th, 2010 at 6:13 am
@Nathan Tyree, i never read jonathon livingston seagull but i was a big fan of ‘lesbian seagull’ in highschool. catchy tune.
React
Nathan Tyree Reply:
July 19th, 2010 at 7:47 am
nicely done
React
Jul 17, 2010 @ 11:16:40
The Ginsberg guy looks like he would fit right in at any poetry coffeeshop in New York City or L.A. today. He looks just like an html giant contributor!
That link to Sugar’s column was also linked by Roxane Gay on html giant, and it has everything to do with being a woman. The fat sow had a miscarriage, big deal. I’ve known girls who’ve had 4 abortions by their own decision! My girlfriend can’t even have kids (having nothing to do with being overweight but simply bad dna) and she isn’t laying in bed for months bemoaning her fate. Because she’s got to get up and go to work, and because she has perspective, and because she is not self obsessed. Shit, some people can’t even get laid in the first place! Just a hundred years ago miscarriages were far more common and also it was accepted that you would lose at least one child to disease or accident before they reached adulthood. Yet, people persisted, lived, managed to be happy and vital. Only spoiled brats can afford to mourn small biological inconveniences to the point of absurdity. I read that column and there is some sadness in her stories about the abused young girls, yes, I am sympathetic, but it was not that powerful, and I can think of a hundred more horrifying stories than the ones she told. Basically the poingnancy of this story is for left-wing, superior minded women of this modern American world.
And before you get outraged at my attitude (too late) remember that you posted the link as a small aside to a larger post about an upcoming movie about Allen Ginsberg.
React
Valerie Reply:
July 19th, 2010 at 6:11 am
@Mather Schneider, i don’t read html giant, unless mr. madore posts something to get them all riled up…
if you think that article is all about being a women and a superior minded woman of ‘this modern american world’ – then that’s your take, i save my outrage for shit that might actually matter man, so no worries.
React
July 19th, 2010 at 8:09 am
@Valerie, fair enough.
React